The daily increasing number of mobile subscribers, the ever evolving nature of mobile services and the widespread use of mobile terminals imply regular adjustment of wireless networks, otherwise call dropping, call rejection and low communication qualities will be observed. Thus, for cellular network operators, whose main concern is to satisfy their subscribers' expectations, network maintenance is one of the most important issues.
A first network maintenance solution consists of regular improvement of radio planning, such as by adding/moving base stations, or by modifying transceivers. However, this approach is costly and complex as the least alteration in the network area (i.e., the appearance of new stations or shops) requires a new planning activity. Furthermore, under this solution, operators are unable to accommodate a sudden and transient increase in traffic (i.e., a demonstration or cultural events).
A second network maintenance approach consists of Radio Resources Management (RMM). In fact, RRM is the most commonly used mechanism to amend wireless networks performance. A network operator has to monitor the system performance constantly on the basis of radio resources allocation among cells. Advantageously, RRM supports a large number of mechanisms (such as frequency allocation procedures integrated in the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS)), increasing the flexibility and easiness of the network configuration.
Hence, RRM is considered as a key functionality in wireless networks to manage and control co-channel interference, while guaranteeing a target grade of services. Thus, wireless network operators usually estimate future needs and, accordingly, reallocate radio resources among cells by adding more resources where needed.
In particular, RRM finds importance in traffic overload scenarios wherein needed resources must be accurately estimated to be allocated where needed. Otherwise, the inability of operators to meet their subscribers' expectation is usually severely criticized.
RRM is usually based on rough estimates which will be manually performed, leading to a sub-optimal radio resources allocation and even, in some cases, an unintentional worsening of the performance of the system by creating for example co-channel interference.